St. Louis — Regardless of the outcome of the Stanford-Kansas game, which will start in about 40 minutes, you can bet that coach Johnny Dawkins will treat the moment with equanimity. He has an extraordinary knack for keeping things on an even keel.

For one thing, he doesn’t care what’s written or said about him, whether it’s in newspapers or blogs or during broadcasts of Stanford games. That’s because he doesn’t pay attention to the opinions of media members.

He recently explained why in a conversation with reporters.

When he was a junior in high school, he said, he was reading a newspaper account of one of his games. His father told him, “You should stop reading that stuff. … If you continue to read what you’re reading, eventually it will always turn. And so if you can’t handle reading the bad, you probably shouldn’t even read the good. Just let it all go.”

“From that point on,” Dawkins said, “I never really kept up with what’s said about me, unless someone says it directly to my face. I have really no clue. My players will tell you I’m the most mindless guy when it comes to knowing what’s out there.

“I think it’s great information, don’t get me wrong, I really do think it’s great, but in our profession it can become a detriment — player or coach — because you can be consumed with what someone else thinks about you, and you’re never going to perform your best if you’re consumed with other people and what their expectations for you are.

“You have to have your own expectations, your own beliefs, and stay true to the course. So I’ve always done that. I always laugh when people say, ‘But did you hear what so and so said?’ I’m like, ‘No, I really haven’t because I really don’t keep up with it at all.’

“I think I’ve been very fortunate that way and learned it a long time ago and I’m very happy that my father told me. I’m trying to figure out how he knew that, because it wasn’t like he played at that level or had that type of exposure, but he sure warned me.”

He said he slipped one time as a sophomore at Duke and read something that was critical of him. “I didn’t like it, and from that point on I never did it again. … And you can imagine how long that is now. I’m not getting any younger.”